Christ and Pop Culture
Both of these bestselling book series feature magical worlds, good-versus-evil battles, and “wizard”-like heroes. But only one seems more prone to Christian fans’ sinful abuse. Read more
Both of these bestselling book series feature magical worlds, good-versus-evil battles, and “wizard”-like heroes. But only one seems more prone to Christian fans’ sinful abuse. Read more
Earlier this month, my wife and I got the chance to see Mud, a film by one of my favorite directors, Jeff Nichols. Mud is a Huckleberry Finn-like narrative set on the banks of the Mississippi in small town Arkansas. Told through the lens of fourteen-year-old Ellis (Tye Sheridan), who, along with his buddy ‘Neckbone’, finds a boat in a tree on an island in the middle of the Mississippi. Living in that boat is a man named Mud (Matthew... Read more
Grumpy Cat. The Stalking Cat. Maru. Each one is a cat that has achieved celebrity status around the world for a quirk their owners were able to capture on film. Have you ever wondered when this trend began? Well, it turns out that the originator of the cat video worked for Thomas Edison. Here is his short film, entitled “The Boxing Cats.” Timestamp: 1894—a year when nothing much happened because everyone was too busy watching and rewatching “The Boxing Cats.” Read more
In June, I reviewed CBS’s summer series Under the Dome. Following the recent announcement that the show would be extended to a second season, NPR’s Linda Holmes gives some thoughtful insights into the difficulties of creating satisfactory resolutions for long-running American TV programs, along with some interesting contrasts to the British way of doing television. Read more
For the past five years, I’ve participated in a sport where old men go to pretend they’re still athletes. Granted, there are dudes out there who still got game, and there are occasionally young guys who come out to play who aren’t over the hill, but for the most part, it’s guys in their mid-30s to mid-40s who have sedentary office jobs and run, jog, and do athletics once a year. The sport is church softball. Church softball is kind... Read more
To what extent does Guillermo del Toro's Pacific Rim hew to H. P. Lovecraft's cosmicism, and to what extent does it diverge? Read more
Derek Webb has released the title-track to his upcoming album, I Was Wrong, I’m Sorry and I Love You. You can watch the video below. It has a message! Though the message is striking, it’s not, in actuality a huge departure from Derek Webb’s previous offerings. Webb has always been a blatant sort of fellow, the kind of musician that writes music with a mind to convince and change minds. When Derek writes a song, typically, you know he’s got... Read more
Following up on Rachel Held Evans’ popular piece on why millenials are leaving the church, over at Mere Orthodoxy, Jake Meador speaks to another trend: the rise of the “chicken-little” evangelical blogger, prognosticating the doom of the church. It’s an interesting counter-point worth considering, especially if you found your heart aflutter with fear for the church’s imminent demise. Read more
"Neither set of readers is listening to what the pope said; they’re hearing what they want to hear." Read more
Should Christians be less skeptical of the places we get our news? Read more
Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In